The Great Arcanist Who Traveled Through the World of American Variety Shows.

Chapter 427: Destroying the Northern Han Dynasty and Reforming the Military System

Richard had expected that the silver coin would be sought after after it was issued, and he was even happy to see it happen. Compared to the wealthy families hoarding copper coins, Richard would rather they hoard gold and silver.

After all, ordinary people hardly use precious metals such as gold and silver, while copper coins are the most widely circulated coins. Ordinary people only use copper coins in their daily lives.

Even these common people might not use silver coins in their entire lives, so the silver coins were collected and stored away by wealthy families, powerful people, and officials and gentry, and had little impact on the common people.

On the contrary, in order to collect these silver coins, the noble families, the powerful, the officials and the gentry had to exchange them for copper coins. Without these people hoarding copper coins, the copper coins circulating in the market would naturally increase.

As for whether it will affect trade, Richard believes that it will not. Commodity transactions are conducted between big merchants, and almost all big merchants have backers.

In the past, the imperial court produced millions of copper coins every year, but after they flowed into the market, there was still a shortage of coins in the market. But now only a few hundred thousand silver coins have been sold, and the shortage of money in the market has been alleviated a lot.

In fact, for copper coins and silver coins, this is also a behavior of bad money driving out good money. In comparison, silver coins are good money and copper coins are bad money. People will spontaneously collect silver coins and no longer chase copper coins.

After seeing this situation, Richard and Guo Rong prepared to increase the suppression of silver coins. Now the court can suppress 700,000 silver coins a year, and because of the scarcity of silver coins, the original profit of 15% has directly become 35%.

The value of a silver coin was one guan, but its actual purchasing power was 1.2 guan or even 1.3 guan. The fiscal revenue of the imperial court increased by more than guan at once. And it would remain like this for a long time, and would continue until the number of silver coins was sufficient.

But the problem is that silver coins have been in short supply for a long time, and with the reopening of the Silk Road and the Maritime Silk Road, a large amount of silver coins will inevitably flow out.

The outflow of silver coins will also bring a large amount of materials into the country, as well as a large amount of silver and gold. Overall, the benefits outweigh the disadvantages.

The imperial court had accumulated a large amount of silver in the past, and all of it was transported to the Baoquan Bureau to be pressed into silver coins.

"Sir, your silver coin method is really useful. It has increased the national treasury's income by millions of strings of cash in one go!" Guo Rong said with conviction.

"It may seem okay now, but future generations may not abide by it!" Richard said calmly, "All we can do is try our best to set up a perfect system."

The imperial court had not previously included silver in the scope of currency, but this time, silver was made into currency, directly turning all the silver in the imperial court's Taifu into tradable currency, which increased the imperial court's income by millions of strings of cash.

At the same time, Richard and Guo Rong ordered the mines to be nationalized. This practice has been normal throughout the dynasties, and these are the private property of the emperor, not the court's money.

Richard and Guo Rong established the Taifu and Shaofu system to separate the national treasury from the emperor's inner treasury. The advantage of this was that the emperor could not use the money from the national treasury to enjoy himself at will.

At the same time, the government stipulated that 80% of agricultural and commercial taxes should be paid to the state treasury, and 20% should be paid to the internal treasury. Taxes on mountains, rivers, lakes, and minerals should be paid to the internal treasury at 50% and the state treasury at 50%.

The emperor had no way of managing so many mines, so he had to let the court collect taxes and split the taxes 50-50. The Hosen Bureau was controlled by the royal family, and the profits from suppressing silver coins were exclusively enjoyed by the royal family. However, the court could also enjoy part of the premium of silver coins.

Richard has established a complete system, but it is unknown how many years these systems can operate.

After Zhou recovered the Sixteen Prefectures of Yanyun, the connection between Northern Han and Khitan was cut off. Northern Han originally only occupied the area around Taiyuan, which is equivalent to the central and northern parts of Shanxi Province today.

However, after Guo Rong launched a northern expedition and defeated the Khitan, he also dealt a few heavy blows to the Northern Han, occupied Yanmen Pass and part of Xinzhou, and completely trapped the Northern Han in the Taiyuan Basin.

Now the Northern Han Dynasty only has the Taiyuan Basin and a few states near Jinyang City.

Although Li Yun did not launch a major war against the Northern Han, he often harassed the Northern Han, preventing it from farming.

The territory of Northern Han was surrounded by mountains, which made Jinyang easy to defend but difficult to attack, but also limited its development, because only the area near the Taiyuan Basin was easy to farm, and the rest of the area was mountainous.

Even if the Northern Han could be breached by force, its strong defense would inevitably cause huge casualties. Therefore, Guo Rong decided to adopt a harassment tactic, which was to send a small force to plunder Jinyang while the Northern Han was engaged in spring plowing.

These soldiers would forcibly abduct the people of Jinyang and then settle them in Youzhou. After the rule of the Khitan, coupled with factors such as war, the population of the Sixteen Prefectures of Yanyun was insufficient. This kind of harassment operation could not only weaken the strength of the Northern Han, but also increase the population of the Sixteen Prefectures of Yanyun.

This way of fighting may not seem to produce much results each time, with only a dozen people at most, but in the long run, the number of people plundered would be considerable. More importantly, large tracts of land in the Northern Han Dynasty became barren, which was an unbearable blow to the Northern Han Dynasty, which was already a small country with a small population.

A large amount of spring farmland in the Northern Han Dynasty was destroyed and the population was plundered. After finally waiting for the autumn harvest, Li Yun once again sent a large number of soldiers to attack the Northern Han Dynasty.

This attack on Northern Han was not to kill the enemy's manpower, but to seize food. Even if not much food could be seized, it would force Northern Han to fortify its defenses and clear the countryside.

The Northern Han Dynasty was already short of food. If they fortified their cities and cleared the fields, the food in the city would inevitably be insufficient. If they did not fortify their cities and clear the fields, the food would be taken away by Li Yun. It would be even better if the Northern Han Dynasty sent a large army to fight Li Yun. The Northern Han Dynasty had at most 30,000 troops, of which only more than 10,000 were elite armored soldiers.

Guo Rong left 30,000 troops in Youzhou, plus the Northern Han army stationed in the south and the Dingnan army. The Northern Han was surrounded by enemies on all sides. If it were not for the mountains and rivers, the Northern Han would have been destroyed long ago.

And if the Northern Han abandoned the city and fought against Li Yun, Li Yun would wake up laughing in his dreams, because this would be the achievement of destroying a country, and he might even be directly crowned a king.

Liu Jun tried to counterattack Li Yun several times, but without the support of Khitan, the Northern Han Dynasty had no ability to fight back against the attacks of Zhou Kingdom.

He wanted to resist, but the Northern Han army suffered defeat after defeat and was finally trapped in Jinyang.

Li Yun's blunt knife cutting meat tactic lasted only one year, and all industries in the Northern Han territory became dire, the population was sparse, and the fields were barren.

Originally, the population of Northern Han was not large, only about 500,000 or 600,000. During this year, people kept fleeing Northern Han, and now the population of Northern Han is likely to be less than 400,000. Coupled with the continuous harassment, Jinyang City has been short of food and grass. In order to maintain the food for the army, Liu Jun could only plunder the food of the people. This caused a large number of people to flee Northern Han.

Li Yun received all the fleeing people, even those who were spies from the Northern Han Dynasty. A large amount of wasteland in the Sixteen Prefectures of Yanyun was distributed, and the population was increasing rapidly.

After more than a year, the national strength of Northern Han became increasingly weak, and many of the original 30,000-strong army began to seek other ways out.

The spring of the second year had just passed, and there were still several months before the summer grain harvest, and many people had no surplus food. Li Yun directly had people spread the word in Northern Han that Youzhou would open its granaries to release grain, and all refugees and displaced persons could obtain 20 mu of land in Youzhou for reclamation, and the government would provide farm tools and food.

As a result, many people in the Northern Han Dynasty who could not survive began to flee in large numbers. Liu Jun tried to stop them, but many soldiers followed him and fled. Anyone could see that the Northern Han Dynasty was on the decline.

Under such circumstances, Guo Rong immediately ordered Li Yun to march to attack Northern Han.

At this time, the Northern Han Dynasty no longer had much strength, and Li Yun's army could be said to be unstoppable.

Many cities surrendered, and the army soon advanced to the city of Jinyang. At this time, only Jinyang City was left in the Northern Han Dynasty.

Facing the high-spirited Zhou army outside the city, Jinyang City only had 10,000 defenders, but the city was also short of food and grass, and the morale of the city was low. Li Yun had people build a platform with earth outside the city, and then set up hundreds of catapults on the high platform, throwing stones or kerosene cans into the city day and night.

At the same time, archers were ordered to shoot arrows into the city, and all the arrows were tied with letters of surrender.

Guo Rong ordered that only surrender could save their lives, and if they made great contributions, they would be rewarded generously. After defeating the Khitan and taking back the Sixteen Prefectures of Yanyun, Guo Rong's reputation was very high, and many people were willing to believe him.

The Emperor Liu Jun of Northern Han also recognized the Khitan Emperor as his uncle. The relationship between the local people and the Khitan was already not good, and now that they recognized a foreigner as their uncle, their sense of identity with Northern Han became even weaker.

Now that they have received Guo Rong's promise, many soldiers are reluctant to fight anymore. At the same time, many local tyrants and noble families have other ideas in their minds.

In just three days, soldiers in Jinyang mutinied and opened the city gates. Li Yun's army took the opportunity to attack the city, and a large number of Northern Han soldiers laid down their weapons and surrendered. On the other hand, Liu Jun saw that the situation was hopeless and had no choice but to surrender.

Li Yun sent people to send Liu Jun's entire family to Kaifeng, and at the same time requested the court to send officials to Northern Han to take over Northern Han's inheritance.

After the Fengwu Youzhou, the loyalty of the Zhou army has increased dramatically. In the past, in a war like this to destroy a country, the emperor would only feel at ease if he personally led the army. He was afraid that his generals would lead the army and then turn around to establish their own country.

Li Yun destroyed the Northern Han Dynasty this time and had the merit of destroying the country, but he still did not dare to overstep his authority. He even sealed up the Northern Han treasury in Jinyang City. Soldiers entering the city were not harmed. These soldiers had walked out of the chaos of the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms and began to move towards a unified dynasty.

When he learned that Li Yun led his army to attack and destroy Northern Han, Guo Rong was very happy, so he appointed Li Yun as Duke of Xinyang, added a fief of 1,000 households, and conferred him the titles of General of the Auxiliary State and Shang Zhuguo.

It can be said that Li Yun directly became the number one military general of the Zhou State.

After the Northern Han was pacified, Richard sent officials to the Northern Han to take over and transported a large amount of food and supplies to help the Northern Han resume production.

At this time, the Northern Han Dynasty had less than 300,000 people left, and a large number of people fled. Fortunately, the battle did not last too long, and the casualties were not large. After the court sent officials to come, it quickly returned to normal.

At the same time, Richard directly implemented the equal distribution of land in Northern Han. At that time, the population of Northern Han was small, a large number of fields were barren, and the aristocratic families were powerless to resist. It was a good time to implement the equal distribution of land.

Richard distributed land to the people and at the same time, he distributed a lot of vacant wasteland to soldiers. Richard was going to implement the Fubing system here.

The chaos of the Five Dynasties had not yet subsided, and to the north of Taiyuan, past Yanmen Pass, was the Khitan grassland, where a large number of soldiers needed to be stationed all year round. If recruiting soldiers or stationing imperial guards was carried out, it would inevitably cost a lot of money and food.

The best way is the Fubing system. As for the Weisuo Military Household System of the Ming Dynasty, it has too many shortcomings. More importantly, the Weisuo Military Household System collapsed too quickly. After all, soldiers not only have to fight, but also have to bear higher taxes than farmers. For these domineering warriors in the Five Dynasties, if you promote the Weisuo Military Household System today, they will dare to rebel tomorrow.

Zhu Yuanzhang's military household system looks like a variation of the fubing system. The military households were allocated land, and each household was required to send one person to serve as a soldier. The fubing system was the same.

But the difference is that the military household system is not responsible for money and grain. Part of the grain obtained from the land they cultivate needs to be handed over to the state as taxes, and part of it is used as military rations, so that they are self-sufficient.

This system seems to be very good. The military households are completely self-sufficient. The court does not need to allocate a penny to support a million-strong army. It can be said that Zhu Yuanzhang was very smart. But people are not fools. If you set up the military household system like this, not only will you have to go to war, but the taxes will be higher than those of farmers. Who is willing to fight for it?
Because the military households were a hereditary system, they had very little room for advancement. They had to farm and fight at the same time, and there were no rewards. Their social status was also low. In addition, the officials in the garrisons controlled almost everything about the local military households. Under this system of having everything, it would be strange if the military households did not have a low will to fight and poor combat capabilities.

The result was that within a few decades of the founding of the country, the Weisuo system collapsed rapidly.

On the contrary, the fubing system was much better. The fubing system also granted the fubing soldiers land, and they needed to cultivate the land. During war, they had to provide their own weapons and horses for battle. However, the fubing system was exempt from taxes. They only needed to perform military service, and did not have to pay any other labor or taxes.

This has great appeal to the people.

The reason for the decline of the fubing system was the decline of the equal-field system. In the early days of the dynasty, when the population was sparse, the equal-field system could be continuously promoted. But when the population gradually increased, the equal-field system could no longer be implemented.

Without their land, the government soldiers would naturally cease to exist.

Finally, in the middle Tang Dynasty, the military system had collapsed and the only option was to recruit soldiers.

This time, Richard planned to improve the military system and re-establish it in some places.

(End of this chapter)